Yeah this is what I'm thinking. Like I said, if the game is good, the people will come.
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Mechwarrior 5: Mercenaries drops Steam and will be available exclusively on EGS [yes, please read STAFF POST]
- Thread starter Deleted member 8196
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Yeah this is what I'm thinking. Like I said, if the game is good, the people will come.
The main issue at hand there is that EGS is about as forthcoming with sales numbers as I am with my medical records
There isn't a lot to go on usually
Sort of the same boat. The problem I know I'll have is as time goes on, my interest is in other games by that stage. Competing games will out compete this game because, they have the feature set I expect on services I trust that are easily accessible. So it's the devs loss even if this is the only option making sense for them.
I have a theory that Epic has a clause preventing developers and publishers from disclosing sale figures until the game exceeds the sales guarantee (or repaid the advance). It would explain why Satisfactory waited until 500k sales before mentioning any sort of sale figure. Likewise, it would explain why the only other EGS game we have numbers for was World War Z, and why they fudged Metro Exodus' figures back at GDC.
Have we had any developers who've gone egs exclusive lament the decision? If the developers in question are ending up with more money in their pocket then they projected launching on steam then it was the right decision for them. If it's working out for all parties involved then we'll probably continue to see these egs deals.
I'd be stunned if any dev was foolish enough to take the blood money and then say 'yo this shit sucked' lol
haha okay that took me back. Wow GFWL was such a piece of trash.
could you link some
i enjoy reading the responses
ive literally seen zero postive responses on twitter or reddit. the most favorited/upvoted posts are always encouraging piracy
The main dev is begging people not to refund.
Maybe should have thought of that before taking Epic's bribe.
AMA notes by bigeyez on Reddit.
Big comments so far:
Big comments so far:
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Dealt with Russ before MWO ever went live, these people don't deserve your money or the license.
>Said epic is NOT paying for refunds. PGI is covering all refunds themselves.
That explains them begging people not to refund.
That makes me worry about how the development was going tbh, sounds like it was about to come in hella hot
I don't read that comment as "begging". Folk have some mighty strong projection going on here and judging from the paltry amount of refund requests I don't think it's nearly as horrific as some are hoping for.
The interesting part I'm reading is how he was shown sales data claiming that EGS games sell better than Steam games. I dunno, I can't really believe it. I'd be curious what goes into their modeling of how well the games would've sold on Steam. I guess this is where Sergey comes in with historical data. You'd think they'd be more public with that.
Why wouldn't you believe it? All the controversy drives up interest in games that otherwise wouldn't be as popular.
Would love to know what games those are purported to be, and find it hard to believe he's that stupid but rather he thinks those he's speaking to are.
The only game that's done better than its studio's Steam releases is World War Z, from Saber, which was a zombie survival game with a big Twitch push that did gangbusters and dropped off, from Saber who have done some good port work and a bunch of shovelware.
Except they've said that everyone that wants one is welcome to request a refund by Sep 1 and they will even allow people to keep the MWO items that they've already redeemed. I don't see how that's begging at all. Russ even said again tonight, feel free to refund if that's what you want to do.
They are currently doing the AMA and here's what their reasoning is:
1) The reason why Steam is less attractive these days is that discoverability is difficult and challenging, you fall off the front page within a moment. With a 150 games released a week its extremely difficult to know if your game is seen by players
Even with a name of Mechwarrior 5, the game is going to disappear of the frontpage of Steam in a week. With the EGS, the benefit there's only one game a week go to the store. With EGS, there's much longer visibility. PGI has actual sales data on products that went on EGS than with projected sales than on Steam and they are very positive. In fact, far more on EGS than previous iterations on Steam
2) The deal with EGS means higher visibility plus bigger cut. The rate 12% for EGS including the Unreal Engine. With Steam its 35% (30% to Valve, 5% to UE4). 750K units on EGS means 1 millions of sales on Steam. So in a situation where the product is not a big hit, EGS is much safer and PGI gets to the recoup point a lot quicker. I don't expect people to care about PGI's profits, but Russ Bollock has run the company for 20 years so you can bet PGI are going to make the decision that will make the game more successful.
3) Gears of War 5 and Borderlands 3 dropping right on top of MW5 in September meant that it would get buried by those major titles. So they chose to delay and thought about their opportunities and ended up on December. Russ also said this would happen last year if a big game would drop. Russ said that he would change the release date if a big game dropped right on top of MW5 back in 2018 during Mech Con.
4) EGS gives more money and allows for a longer delay. The money allows PGI to hire more people, make localization ready for release, and gives them a much heavier marketing push. The early December release means they can comfortably develop the game without too much pressure (less crunch!). It also means it will be released in German, French and Russian. The marketing budget is much bigger and it's not small. They've also hired more employees like narrative designers, localization, lighting artists.
With all these factors, it was the right decision they made for the studio. The game now has a much better chance to succeed. Russ bases these hopes on actual things on past sales of past Mechwarrior games. The bottom line is shipping a good game. For us we have to stay focused on making a great game and that's all we can focus on. Going to the EGS gives it a better chance for higher sales will lead to other Mechwarrior titles because the game will get better from this delay.
Sales data: Pre-orders for MW5 is 20.000. 700 have asked for a refund today. More will come obviously. (MW:Online got 70.000 back in 2012 but that was during the heyday of Kickstarters)
Sales target: "Our aspirations is that we want to sell a million units. If we hit the quality level needed, we expect the game to sell well."
Steam keys are not allowed for pre-orders any longer because Valve no longer allows this for developers who go EGS exclusive. It changed after the last Metro.
Mod Morrigan feel free to threadmark this post. It probably is of interest to people interested in the business arrangements between Valve and Epic.
1) The reason why Steam is less attractive these days is that discoverability is difficult and challenging, you fall off the front page within a moment. With a 150 games released a week its extremely difficult to know if your game is seen by players
Even with a name of Mechwarrior 5, the game is going to disappear of the frontpage of Steam in a week. With the EGS, the benefit there's only one game a week go to the store. With EGS, there's much longer visibility. PGI has actual sales data on products that went on EGS than with projected sales than on Steam and they are very positive. In fact, far more on EGS than previous iterations on Steam
2) The deal with EGS means higher visibility plus bigger cut. The rate 12% for EGS including the Unreal Engine. With Steam its 35% (30% to Valve, 5% to UE4). 750K units on EGS means 1 millions of sales on Steam. So in a situation where the product is not a big hit, EGS is much safer and PGI gets to the recoup point a lot quicker. I don't expect people to care about PGI's profits, but Russ Bollock has run the company for 20 years so you can bet PGI are going to make the decision that will make the game more successful.
3) Gears of War 5 and Borderlands 3 dropping right on top of MW5 in September meant that it would get buried by those major titles. So they chose to delay and thought about their opportunities and ended up on December. Russ also said this would happen last year if a big game would drop. Russ said that he would change the release date if a big game dropped right on top of MW5 back in 2018 during Mech Con.
4) EGS gives more money and allows for a longer delay. The money allows PGI to hire more people, make localization ready for release, and gives them a much heavier marketing push. The early December release means they can comfortably develop the game without too much pressure (less crunch!). It also means it will be released in German, French and Russian. The marketing budget is much bigger and it's not small. They've also hired more employees like narrative designers, localization, lighting artists.
With all these factors, it was the right decision they made for the studio. The game now has a much better chance to succeed. Russ bases these hopes on actual things on past sales of past Mechwarrior games. The bottom line is shipping a good game. For us we have to stay focused on making a great game and that's all we can focus on. Going to the EGS gives it a better chance for higher sales will lead to other Mechwarrior titles because the game will get better from this delay.
Sales data: Pre-orders for MW5 is 20.000. 700 have asked for a refund today. More will come obviously. (MW:Online got 70.000 back in 2012 but that was during the heyday of Kickstarters)
Sales target: "Our aspirations is that we want to sell a million units. If we hit the quality level needed, we expect the game to sell well."
Steam keys are not allowed for pre-orders any longer because Valve no longer allows this for developers who go EGS exclusive. It changed after the last Metro.
Mod Morrigan feel free to threadmark this post. It probably is of interest to people interested in the business arrangements between Valve and Epic.
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If I recall correctly, adding Steam was just a feather in their cap and and they expected boost of money and players but it only ended up being a bump. They had reached a multi-year milestone and were planning a bunch of expansions and also incidentally an ill fated Space battle game that had fuck-all to do with Mechwarrior. I guess the Steam boost from all the Steam members who weren't already playing MWO was supposed to support all of that, but instead they had to scale back and focus on Mechwarrior stuff only because while a lot of existing members migrated to Steam, the new user interest wasn't incredibly high. So Steam didn't solve all their money woes, and they had to go back to seeking funds.
Keepingin mind that they're not innocent in this, because they tried to leverage and expand into other games at the expense of their MWO player base.
a name i've not heard in a long time...a long time......
I'm still amazed the game still has a player base. I put the game on pause twice and both times when I returned, It felt like the player base was shrinking. I guess I was wrong.
I'll assume they aren't arguing that going with EGS will net you so much bad publicity that you get more sales. I'm inclined to think their projections work more like "Coffeestain Studios found more success with first week sales of Satisfactory on EGS than first week sales of their Goat Simulator on Steam". They are nabbing companies' biggest games yet after all. It would be nice to see sales figures for games that launched on both platforms. But all I know of are the Subnautica expansion and the new Vampire game coming up.
Bit 1: So a little less than 5% for day of announcement refunds, I expect that to probably grow past 10% or so
Bit 2: Yeah that makes sense for Valve to set that standard, that Metro shit was fuckin' wildin
If you look at the reasons that PGI has made here, it makes perfect sense to make the move. A delay that avoids crunch, hiring more people, bigger marketing push, more visibility, more localization, 12 percent cut versus a 35 percent cut. The game will end up on Steam and GOG regardless. You would be crazy to say no to that.
Sorry if it offends anyone, but imagine waiting 17 years for a singleplayer Mechwarrior and then tapping out right at the end because you have to launch the game through a different software launcher than promised.
Its a bit fucking more than just a launcher. Were it that there wouldn't be any outrage, only annoyance at most.
ok i'm imagining it. what are you trying to say about that person?
Imagine bending over backwards just cause you wanna play a game bad.
What more does it do? It's still just a singleplayer game and it'll get to Steam eventually anyway. By the way, did you read my summary of the AMA reasoning? It makes perfect sense for doing what they do.
That they probably should get some perspective and understand where the developers are coming from. And it's probably not that big of a problem to install EGS to launch mw5mercs.exe and it'll come to Steam next year anyway
Yep, lots of backwards bending for singleplayer-starved Mechwarrior fans by installing yet another software client on their PC. 17 years of waiting and you tap out now because of this? Sorry I just can't relate.
User Banned (1 Day): Hostility; Previous Warning for Hostility
Fuck off with your 'software launcher' bullshit clown. Keep doing PR for Epic for free.
It is pretty air tight... I think people would have a hard time arguing against those numbers. It almost feels like the only responsible move to make.
It doesn't help when MWO left a bad taste. Poorly optimized, slow updates, 500 dollar skins and packs, pay2win gimmicks and a ridiculous grind for people who don't have money.
It was a fun game that felt like it was never going to be in a polished state and they way real money was involved felt gross. Maybe Epics money can help them avoid any of that, but im not convinced.
Blech. I was already leery of this game given that I haven't exactly been impressed with Piranha, and the videos I've seen have hardly blown my socks off. This is the proverbial final nail for me.
Hard pass. Fuck this noise. When I have time for it, I'll get the DLC for Battletech 2018 and play that some more. PGI can you-know my whats-it.
RIP MW. Mechs down at Nav Gamma. :[
whew, that's an *easy* ignore. Imagine being this disingenuous unironically.
Hard pass. Fuck this noise. When I have time for it, I'll get the DLC for Battletech 2018 and play that some more. PGI can you-know my whats-it.
RIP MW. Mechs down at Nav Gamma. :[
whew, that's an *easy* ignore. Imagine being this disingenuous unironically.
Sorry I just don't see the outrage given the situation the game developers are in and given how difficult it is to install another software launcher or wait a year until it gets on Steam. Assuming someone is a Mechwarrior fan and waited 17 years for this.
As far as I have read, that was the fault of IGP, the publisher who decided much of what PGI was allowed to do back then. That publisher since went bankrupt because it was a scam apparently.
Yes, December 2020.
Just because you waited for something for almost two decades doesn't mean you can't be disappointed by it tho
Or how it's being handled
Or how it's being handled
After MWO, trust in the devs was already low. They're gonna start this new project by putting money first/ fan base second. I'll keep waiting.
Eh, the amount of shit Mechwarrior players have to go through to get any of the old games running... this isn't going to seem like that big an imposition.
Well, we know Epic only takes a 12% cut, so developers should theoretically be ecstatic to release there, if sales are good. How many games are releasing there without an Epic deal? Genuine question, I don't follow the store closely.
Shit, I am noping out of Shenmue 3, which was one of my dream games of last two decades basically. Compared to that, MW5 is nothing. Sad to see both go that route, and I do understand the reasoning for MW5 (Shenmue is Deep Silver's bullshit for the most part), but still, fuck that. Maybe I'll get these games on Steam for a fraction of the price if something else doesn't distract me and I am not angry about the whole thing at that point, but overall, meh.
Also, it's hugely disingenuous to write off EGS bullshit as just a launcher, as at this point its just trolling (and to ignore that person goes).
Also, it's hugely disingenuous to write off EGS bullshit as just a launcher, as at this point its just trolling (and to ignore that person goes).
Almost all of them have a deal attached to bring them there, exceptions are usually either older games or AAA games like Cyberpunk
I think Cyberpunk and new Vampire Bloodlines are the only exceptions so far. We'll probably see more AAAs release simultaneously there as well, but everything else has a money bag attached.